Music has been an important part of human culture for thousands of years. Musical instruments have been created, developed, and modified over time to allow humans to make music. Though music has changed dramatically between cultures over the course of thousands of years, many instruments used to create music have not. A guitar, for example, has a number of strings that extend along a neck of the guitar, and when plucked or stricken will vibrate at a certain frequency. By modifying the tension on the strings through pressure from a player's fingers, the vibration frequency of the string and corresponding sound made by the vibrating string may be changed. The strings extend along a neck. This interface of a guitar has not been changed in hundreds of years.
Though a musician playing an instrument may make playing that instrument look simple, it is difficult for inexperienced users to play many musical instruments. Typically, it takes thousands of hours of practice to develop the necessary motor skills, combined with music lessons to obtain the musical knowledge, for a person to achieve a high level of proficiency on a musical instrument. In the modern era, many games and devices seek to allow an individual to play a musical instrument, such as a guitar, without having to depress strings on a guitar neck or strum the guitar strings. These instruments succeed in outputting sound, but generally have limited musical range and expressiveness, still require musical knowledge, and do not provide the user with a rewarding experience while playing the instrument. What is needed is an improved musical instrument.